<B>The Red Baroness swoops in</B> <BR> <P>'Tessa Blackstone comes to the job of minister for the arts with a wealth of experience and a reputation for toughness. She explains her task to Norman Lebrecht in The Daily Telegraph.'<P><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>IF there is one member of the second Blair Government who knows whereof she speaks, it is Tessa Blackstone, Baroness of Stoke Newington. The new minister for the arts sat for 10 years on the board of the beleaguered Royal Opera House, six of them as chair of the Royal Ballet. No need to submit her to an arts quiz. She knows the repertoire better than the present Covent Garden chairman, Sir Colin Southgate, whose tenure is now in her gift.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Chris Smith, replaced by Tessa Jowell as the Senior Minister in this area, which also includes Sport, had built up a very strong reoutation in the Arts world and especially in dance. Sadly, we all need a bit of luck and he was associated with a couple of projects which went sour and his head was on the block. <P>Blackstone should be good in the job.<P><A HREF="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=005340313727917&rtmo=axa22NpL&atmo=tttttttd&pg=/et/01/6/27/batess27.html" TARGET=_blank><B>More...</B></A>

<B>Look into my eyes, and believe</B> <BR> <P>Things can only get better, Tessa Jowell, the new Culture Secretary, assures our sceptical correspondent - RICHARD MORRISON for The Times <BR> <BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>The new Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport arranges herself delightfully on the sofa in her new House of Commons office. She doesn’t so much sit on it as kneel sideways in a remarkable yoga-esque L-shape: a posture which hints flatteringly that we are to have a cosy tête-à-tête, yet mysteriously manages to maintain her perfectly drilled coiffure and dapper suit in a majestic panoply of ministerial authority. <BR>It is a triumph of poise over gravity. Tessa Jowell has yet to utter a word, and already I am dazzled.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P><BR><A HREF="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,62-2001223863,01.html" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A>

Mrs Morris was only briefly out of the government When Estelle Morris stepped down as education secretary last year, Downing Street let it be known that her ministerial career was not over. Mrs Morris left her job citing the pressures of such a high profile role in government.

Now she is back - admittedly in the more junior position of minister of state for the arts.

Elevating Mrs Morris to the helm of such a big, high-profile government department as education was always a risky move.

Article from The Independent on how more and more women are assuming top jobs in arts organisations.

Quote:

After centuries of playing second fiddle to narrow cliques of male curators and theatre managers, women are outperforming men to reach the upper echelons of major arts institutions, according to a new government study.

The revolution is being trumpeted by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport. It has found that more than 60 per cent of people appointed to posts at chief executive level in the arts over the past three years were women.

Good to see that four of those mentioned are primarily based in dance - Monica Mason, Sue Hoyle, Deborah Bull and Katherine Dore plus another who has responsibility for dance - Kim Evans, Head of Performing Arts at Arts Council England.

The arts column: please let the arts breathe, Miss Morris Rupert Christiansen for The Daily Telegraph offers some advice to the new arts minister.

Nice, hard-working, earnest Estelle Morris, who resigned as Education Secretary last October with the honest admission that she found the brief too much for her, has been returned to government very quickly. In last week's reshuffle, Tony Blair found her a pleasant little niche as arts minister under the umbrella of Tessa Jowell's Department of Culture, Media and Sport. Congratulations, and welcome back.

Miss Morris shouldn't find this placement too demanding: at present, there seems to be very little requiring urgent attention in the in-tray.

Newly-appointed Arts Minister Estelle Morris admitted yesterday she had a lot to learn about the culture sector.

The Yardley MP, who resigned as Education Secretary last year, said she was "more likely to be seen at the cinema or an art gallery than the ballet or the opera" and was worried about showing her ignorance.

But her enthusiasm for film did not prevent her getting the title of the last movie she saw slightly wrong, in an interview yesterday.

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